User blog:HPCStAlbans/Getting a change of use…….
After failing to find an alternative site to open my own club I decided a change of direction was needed. I needed to continue my own development and sitting behind a desk with a sales head on pushing my sales guys to sell more memberships was not doing this, in fact it was doing the opposite. I was stagnating in a sales culture, although I can sell and motivate other to do so, I do have to believe in what I selling to remain passionate, and selling memberships to a club that I knew was substandard to its potential I found de-motivating. So I decided to move into another area of the fitness industry that I’d previously incorporated into my management roles, and that was education. As a health & fitness manager and in a role I’d performed for Holmes Place in Mill Hill as a Master Trainer I’d incorporated onsite training into my role for the fitness staff I’d managed. I always found this highly rewarding and enjoyable, me getting paid to talk about my first love and passion, what could be better, those of you that know me or will meet me will be able to vouch for that, in fact it’s often a double edged sword with strengths and weakness commonly being the same, I can talk and talk about how to train or what to do in certain fitness situations, the key as always is to manage the weakness element and know when to shut up, I get this right most the time but not always, hey know ones perfect! So I took a less intensive assistant fitness managers role with Champneys in Tring whilst I tried to gain some formal assessing and teaching experience in the industry. It wasn’t long before I’d gained enough assessing and teaching work to go freelance and work fulltime as a Freelance Tutor & Assessor. I’d been working for AMAC in Kent, The Weight Management Centre & Discovery Learning in Tooting assessing and delivering fitness and weight management qualifications. I’d been fortunate enough to work alongside some great individuals and gained the knowledge and confidence to start delivering Weight Management and Childhood Obesity courses to the NHS as part of my freelance work for The Weight Management Centre & Discovery Learning, this meant delivering courses to GP’s, Nutritionists, Social Works and various other NHS support staff. I also during this time I set up my own niche education company called Advanced Training Philosophies Ltd with a friend Paul Spence who is a Sports Therapist. We have since delivered courses based on Postural Correction and Self Myofascial Release which my business partner and I wrote and had accredited by the Register of Exercises Professionals. We have since delivered theses courses to over 250 personal trainer and therapists. Throughout this time though I kept an eye out for suitable sites in St Albans to open my own facility, however on the few occasions I found suitable sites I ran into the same problem of landlords either not wanting fitness facilities in their buildings or not willing to work with me whilst I gained the appropriate change of use from the council to use the site for leisure. It was after such a visit to a site in Redbourne that I decided in frustration to drive down to the original site in St Albans and see what was going on down there. To my amazement the site was still empty three and a half years after I originally viewed the building, in fact I later found out that some masking tape I’d put on the floor in one of the rooms to workout if showers would fit was still stuck to the floor, it was as is time had stood still. I immediately called the agent for the building and found that the building had indeed remained empty for the intervening years and that the landlord had since passed away. His son in law was now managing the building and after several phone calls he proved willing to work with me whilst I applied to the council for a change of use to secure a D2 license allowing me to use the site for leisure. So the wheels were set in motion, a town planner was appointed to help me with what I knew would be a complex and challenging application, and the property was secured giving me exclusivity for the 10 weeks the application was expected to take. Category:Blog posts Category:Health & Fitness